Final 12 months, 2024, was an enormous deal for elections in London – the Mayor and Meeting in Could and the Basic Election in July. However there was additionally a gentle stream of by-elections for seats on London borough councils, which gave us a steady though not all the time straightforward to interpret commentary on London’s electoral temperature. These will proceed in 2025.
The primary contest might be on 13 February, when Barnet Labour defend their seat at Burnt Oak. Over the next weeks there might be by-elections in Brent, Hammersmith & Fulham, Barking & Dagenham and Westminster too. It’s subsequently an acceptable second to pause and look again, and see what the outcomes and polling should say about how Londoners are feeling now – and the way they could vote within the close to future.
There have been by-elections for 25 borough seats between the final election and the top of 2024. Labour defended 24 of the vacancies, holding 21 of them, shedding two (one in Greenwich, one in Westminster) to the Conservatives and one (in Hackney) to the Greens. The opposite seat was a Conservative emptiness (in Ealing) that was misplaced to the Liberal Democrats.
The 14 by-elections that came about on the identical day as the final election confirmed a fall within the Labour vote since he full borough elections of Could 2022, principally to the advantage of the Greens and Independents. The Conservatives’ total share was up barely, largely due to one distinctive efficiency (Hackney’s Cazenove ward).
The 25 held since then have seen a considerably bigger fall for Labour, with Independents and others once more gaining and Reform UK (which didn’t contest any borough seats on 4 July) becoming a member of in whereas the Inexperienced beneficial properties have stopped. The Conservatives are practically flat – a poor final result on condition that 2022 was by some measures (complete seats, vote share margin in opposition to Labour) their worst ever set of London borough elections.
The autumn in Labour’s share may be exaggerated as a result of the seats being defended, each on and since 4 July, had been disproportionately Labour-voting and, as demonstrated within the basic election, Labour help is down most in beforehand sturdy areas.
London Labour can take some consolation from the by-election outcomes, in distinction to the get together’s fortunes in the remainder of the nation. Labour misplaced 12.5 per cent of the vacancies they had been defending in London, whereas in the remainder of the nation the loss charge was a startling 48.4 per cent (31 losses out of 64 defences). The swing is usually decrease in London and the seats are safer, which means they will stand up to opposed swings – significantly if the beneficial properties at their expense are shared between a number of completely different opposition candidates.
Left wing and localist opposition, even in its stronger areas like Newham and Islington, appears inadequate to truly win seats – a distinction with the pre-general election efficiency of the Newham Independents. Labour even superior in Tower Hamlets Bow East, within the absence of a candidate from Aspire, the longest-established native/left/Islamic get together in London.
Nonetheless, a warning signal is that within the six Labour wards the place the Conservatives had received a semi-respectable vote share of over 20 per cent in 2022, the swing of 11.1 per cent was effectively above the London common of 6.5 per cent and enough to ship two Tory beneficial properties in marginal wards.
There’s a restricted quantity to conclude from the by-elections in regards to the place of the Lib Dems – within the two wards they critically contested (Ealing, Hanger Hill and Greenwich, West Thamesmead) they superior strongly however they made little influence elsewhere. Their environment friendly distribution of the vote was key to their victories within the basic election – and in previous native elections – and there’s no purpose to doubt their campaigning abilities of their finest areas.
London stays an space of weak point for Reform. Their efficiency in borough by-elections has been poor, in distinction to past the M25. The get together’s highest share of the vote was 16.9 per cent in what ought to have been the beneficial territory of Belvedere ward, Bexley.
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A special measure of the capital’s political temper was made in December by the polling organisation Extra in Frequent, when it printed the primary MRP for the reason that basic election. The MRP methodology makes use of a large-sample opinion ballot and complex statistical and demographic evaluation to mannequin what the outcomes could be in every parliamentary constituency.
The ballot supplies further proof that London, having swung in a restrained trend to Labour between 2019 and 2024, has moved away from the get together lower than voters in different areas have for the reason that basic election. The London swing is barely 3.7 per cent in comparison with six per cent nationally. Satisfyingly, that is similar to the swing being picked up in borough by-elections between July and now (3.4 per cent).
In response to the ballot, one other basic election would see Labour lose solely 5 London constituencies out of 59, and people by tiny margins that tactical voting may in all probability bridge: Bexleyheath & Crayford, Hendon and Uxbridge & South Ruislip to the Conservatives; Dagenham & Rainham to Reform UK and Ilford North to an Unbiased. London MPs would type just below 1 / 4 of the 228-strong Parliamentary Labour Get together, the same proportion to what it was following the 2019 election.
The MRP gave extra element than scattered native by-elections may in regards to the advance of Reform. Their help in London was up from 8.7 per cent in July 2024 to 12 per cent in December, effectively under their nationwide share of 20.7 per cent. The acquire was pretty evenly unfold, with their vote up in each constituency and above deposit-saving ranges even of their weakest constituencies in cosmopolitan inside London.
Nonetheless, their vote remains to be concentrated in a small variety of boroughs: Barking & Dagenham, Bexley, Bromley and Havering most of all, adopted by Hillingdon and Sutton – aside from Bromley, these had been the boroughs that voted in 2016 to depart the European Union. Reform’s beneficial properties within the 2026 borough elections is prone to be concentrated in these areas, plus maybe a handful of wards in different outer boroughs which may be picked off by means of concentrating on.
Map: Reform UK share share of the vote in December 2024 MRP. Darkish blue: over nationwide share (20.7 per cent), gentle blue: 15-20.7 per cent; beige: 9-15 per cent (across the London common); pink: under 9 per cent.
The opposite Reform impact is on the prospects of the Conservatives, and the ballot suggests that will be felt each immediately and not directly. The direct impact is the division of the right-wing vote that might allow Labour to outlive regardless of a fall in its personal help. This is applicable at parliamentary, mayoral and borough degree (though one ought to do not forget that whereas there’s an electoral crossover, removed from all Reform and Conservative voters regard the opposite get together as acceptable).
The oblique impact is on the Conservatives’ political technique. Reform workouts political gravity on the Tories, encouraging the proper of the get together to see electoral profit from heading ever additional in that route. The Tories polled 21 per cent on the basic election and, with a Reform-lite candidate in Susan Corridor, 33 per cent for London Mayor two months beforehand. The distinction was largest in boroughs the place Reform polled effectively in July.
The price of veering to the populist proper is that the Tories will alienate much more of what was their London core vote of educated centre-right professionals. There is no such thing as a additional to fall in parliamentary phrases, though Extra In Frequent’s ballot confirmed Labour growing their majorities over the Tories in Chelsea & Fulham and Cities of London & Westminster.
Nonetheless, a significant plot strand of the 2026 London borough elections will centre across the Tories’ makes an attempt to regain two of their most painful losses from 2022, Wandsworth and Westminster. If Kemi Badenoch’s get together stays on its present trajectory it must rely both on a unfavorable vote prompted by Labour unpopularity or on the power of the native Tories to function as a loosely-affiliated franchise somewhat than a department of the nationwide get together. The Tories are nonetheless not providing a lot to the voters of Battersea, as an example.
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The MRP is much less assist with assessing the menace to Labour from the left. The overall election demonstrated that there’s a pool of votes broadly to the left of the place Labour now stands. Many of those voters rallied to Labour’s banner when the get together was led by Jeremy Corbyn, however seemed elsewhere in 2024, significantly within the gentle of the conflict in Gaza. The left bloc, in distinction to the proper bloc shed by the Tories in 2024, doesn’t have a single residence and is break up between the Greens and numerous kinds of Unbiased and small get together candidates.
The ceasefire in Gaza is unlikely to finish the phenomenon of the Gaza Independents, though they could get one other identify. The way forward for Palestine remains to be perilous and each the scope and the willingness of the Labour authorities to take the type of daring stand demanded by many Muslims and left-wingers are restricted. There are additionally quite a few points on which Muslims, typically left-wing in economics, not all the time socially liberal, and with a selected angle on immigration, will proceed to dissent from Labour’s line.
In distinction to Reform, which appears prone to organise a big slate of candidates in its higher areas in for the 2026 borough elections, it stays unsure what number of candidates of the Gaza Unbiased sort will come ahead, and the place and whether or not teams such because the Newham Independents and the Islington Corbynites can organise efficient borough-wide campaigns.
Additionally it is unclear whether or not there might be collaboration between the Greens and the Independents and left-localists. There seems to be a growing frequent entrance in Hackney, however there’ll undoubtedly be native variations. The politics of Tower Hamlets stay sophisticated, with the governing Aspire Get together shedding some councillors to Unbiased standing however choosing up defectors from Labour.
In its London heartlands, Labour could possibly be set to face its largest problem since 2006, the borough elections after the Iraq conflict. However challengers have mountains to climb. In distinction to 2006, once they turned the biggest get together in Brent and Camden and disadvantaged Labour of a majority in Lewisham, the Lib Dems appear unlikely to make main inroads into Labour territory.
There are all the time native variations and counter-currents in London borough elections. The 2022 elections had been, on the whole, a catastrophe for the Conservatives, however there have been two locations the place they made good progress: Harrow, the place they gained management, benefiting from traits throughout the Hindu neighborhood, and Croydon, the place they received the primary mayoral election held in that borough following a interval of poor monetary administration beneath Labour.
On the precedent of the final election and the proof of continuous fragmentation since then, the 2026 borough elections appear significantly prone to current a blended image, though in most locations Labour had been close to their most in 2022 and may be anticipated to undergo losses. We will see what emerges from the by-elections this 12 months, and the way they’ll alter our expectations.
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